


A Correspondent in the Armor

by herbailiwick



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Letters, M/M, Texting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-22
Updated: 2013-03-22
Packaged: 2017-12-06 02:39:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/730625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/herbailiwick/pseuds/herbailiwick
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For cmcross, who prompted: "Crowley writes Sam (love?) letters and leaves them in increasingly not-so-secret places. Sam worries about Dean finding them and flipping his shit." Doesn't exactly cover the prompt, but it's still got letters.</p><p>Starts sometime after "Survival of the Fittest". Lots of pictures, sorry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Correspondent in the Armor

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cmcross](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cmcross/gifts).



The first time there's an unexplainable envelope with Sam's name on it in his duffle, Sam tosses it into the middle of the motel bed, eyes wide. He paces, hesitates a dozen times. What if...something bad happens, if he opens it? Obviously it's not Dean's handwriting. Cas's?

That's all he needs. Reminders of...Sam sighs. He finally decides to tear open the envelope. If he's done for, he's done for. No one's around to care anyway. Sam doesn't even care anymore.

Sam tosses the torn envelope back onto the bed, unfolding the hastily-folded piece of...red-bordered stationary inside.

Sam grips the stupid thing so hard it crinkles around where he's forming a fist. He blinks as he realizes he's just gotten angry for the first time in days. Anything to cut through the monotony of sadness, right?

But Sam still sort of spends the next day watching crap TV and grieving.

***

Left, lying open across the passenger seat of the Impala. Sam gets the message. 

The next day, Sam goes out and kills exactly two Leviathan. He calls it a day, though.

No, he calls it a wrap, for now, like that's good enough, even though it isn't. Because he can't get Dean out of his head, the way Dean cocks a gun, the things Dean says, that time Dean splashed him with Borax and it got in his eyes and they'd had to flush it out and Dean was so _sorry_.

Dean will never join him again.

Sam's apple has no taste.

Sam's shoe is stained in black Leviathan goo.

Two is two. No, its not ideal, but it's two. And Crowley will just have to deal.

***

The third letter somehow ends up taped to the top of the box of pizza he orders, and a very confused pizza man gives him his change, eyeing the letter.

"It's for you?" he asks, and Sam just nods, heading over to the desk and showing the man the envelope from the first letter with an identical, "Sam" written on it.

"My friend's a real...asshat," Sam says with a shrug.

Actually, the Borax does work. He wonders why he'd never thought to try that before.

He looks through the want ads for a job in town and watches half an episode of _Dr Sexy, MD_.

Sam works his way down to another shirt with a hole in it, living off TV, coffee, and futile, tentative prayers to Cas.

***

On the ceiling, which he just barely manages to reach when standing on the bed, he finds the fourth letter.

After much contemplation and the honest temptation to spend the cash, Sam is surprised at how well this seems to inspire him to start fresh. As he learned when the business with his soul came up, if he's getting sympathy from _Crowley_ , something must really be wrong with his choices.

He buys a new shirt, but not with the cash Crowley gave him. Spending it might mean he owes Crowley something, and he doesn't want that. Best not to even mess with anything that might have unexpected strings.

He tracks down Leviathan for the next two days and kills them, focusing on his new shirt, on his Borax-cleaned shoes, trying not to let the loss overwhelm him. The loss still wins, but he feels less hopeless than he had the last time.

In a strange way, he feels bad that he's not in quite as much pain hunting without Dean as he'd been during that first attempt.

Nothing makes sense.

He's starting to get tired of the Impala. It's never really felt like his. It's always been Dean's, and Dean's gone, gone forever maybe.

Sam receives and ignores calls of sympathy from a couple hunters he doesn't really keep in touch with. He then decides to stop using his phones. He picks up one that no hunter should have the number to. It feels good. But so much else still feels really bad.

***

There are no letters anywhere in the room for the next few days, and this only serves to depress Sam a little. Even when he does things right, he still gets punished for them, it seems. Although, that's not true.

He made it back from the Cage, and Cas took the damage off his hands. So maybe Sam doesn't deserve any further rewards. Maybe he's maxed out. Maybe that check has bounced.

Finally, a note comes, left outside the bathroom door on the ground while he showers. Somehow, he's not as disturbed by this as he should be, picking it up with wet fingertips.

And because he's sad and lonely and a little bit reckless, he charges up his phone, finds the contact number for Crowley that he'd had from when they'd been working for him, and texts him.

He doesn't know if he wants an answer. He honestly doesn't know. But, then, it comes, a generic sound making him swallow as the thing appears and he reads,

**Yeah.** It's all he can think of for a minute. Then, he quickly adds a warning. 

"Oh, is that so?" Sam asks his phone, which is...a really stupid thing to do.

He sets the phone on the bed and shakes his head. He doesn't move until he hears the next text alert.

Sam grits his teeth.

He remembers the reason he has Crowley's number in the first place. They were trying to bag a Skinwalker, a guy they'd referred to as Lucky. Sam had literally thrown a ball to mock the guy. Stupid thing is, Sam loves dogs. Though, knowing he was supposed to love them had pissed him off during that case.

Sam doesn't have time for Crowley's flattery. Crowley's a demon, and demons don't flatter for free.

Sam settles into bed and drags a book toward him, _The Fellowship of the Ring_. Dean's. Even just holding it should hurt, but it's not as gut-punched a feeling as he'd gotten the first time he picked it up. At this rate, he might actually finish it.

After four alerts, Sam decides enough is enough.

He swallows, not sure if it's the right thing to do, but he can't just have Crowley texting him at odd hours. The letters were bad enough. What's Crowley's angle, anyway? Slow torment was preferable to just icing Sam back at the lab?

Sam actually sets the book down, cradling the phone in his hand in confusion. What exactly are the strings on that cash? Where does it hide its brains?

That's a good one.

Sam knows Crowley won't let it, whatever "it" is, go. Or, at least he hopes he won't. He leans onto his side, now focused on the screen of his new phone. But, when Crowley asks if he wants the truth, he freaks.

Oh man. Seriously, he's not helping things at all. Crowley is going to get fed-up and Sam'll just stay in the motel room til his cash gives out, until he'll have to drive that damn car to somewhere else, until it runs out of gas and he'll have to...do... _something_. 

A job, maybe. Like, a real job. Some of the stuff in the paper didn't look too bad. He doesn't really mind jobs. It's just. He feels drained. Honestly, really drained, and sort of...too open, like everything can rush inside of him, all of the pain the stupid world has always had that he'd tried to rise above.

Sam blinks. Actually, yeah, that's the plan. "You're a bastard," he tells Crowley through the phone. Except, he's not talking to Crowley, he just sort of wishes he was, but he's glad he's not. He's not really looking to piss off the King of Hell, not when he feels like he wouldn't even really fight hard enough to stop his demise.

There. That's it. They can both agree that's a likely scenario. 

"What?" he asks aloud, and then he types it in. **What?**

What does Crowley mean, it's not his problem? It was Sam's fault the demons came out of the Devil's Gate, Sam's fault Lucifer rose, Sam's fault Lucifer went back under, which made Crowley king, and he's never exactly been up for killing Crowley like he should be, like anyone in their right mind would be, except here and there, but sometimes he just...he sort of likes that if anyone is in charge of Hell, it's Crowley.

Oh, that sounds awful.

But, at least if Sam is going to Hell, he sort of admires its king.

Oh, that's fucked up.

Sam narrows his eyes at the stupid text message. He knows that, okay? He knows his options. It's just...one of them's got to be _right_ , right? Isn't he still paying some kind of something, especially now that Cas took Lucifer from him and went crazy and died because Sam wasn't fast enough?

Sam finally responds.

Sam frowns. Good?

Sam sets his phone on the desk and tries to get back in the mood to read the book.

***

Sam never does call Crowley, and Crowley doesn't text again. Sam saves the messages, though, like a creeper, like a real loser, and he hates himself for it, just like he hates that he saved the letters. It's stupid of him, yeah.

But, then again, few people even know who Crowley _is_.

Sam doesn't receive another letter until after he's seen Crowley again, and all Crowley greets him with is, "Moose. Still with the pork chops. I admire that." It's a surreal moment, but most meetups with Crowley end up feeling that way.

And Sam can't exactly say that he hates that fact. 


End file.
